The Collected Stories - Amy Hempel

"Can a woman hurt you as much as a man?"
"Worse. They understand you better, so they can hurt you worse."

The stereotypical differences between men and woman always perplex me. At times they can be so subtle, and others so grave. I think the difference lies in this:
most women tend to fall for multiple men. We strive to be different, the exception, makes him whole, makes him want to be loyalfaithfullovingsensitivecompassionate. We want to change men. We not only want them to want to fit our molds, but fill them and maintain their shape as well. We want to be able to say, "that's how he used to be, I mean, at least until he met me." And this desire isn't extended to just one male--no, it's extended to every male we are attracted to in any form, sometimes even those we are not. Women want to be the one men talk about--the one inside their heads, but more importantly inside their hearts.
Men, on the other hand, don't share this admittedly twisted desire. Instead, men fall for an impressively small number of women. Most of them never get inside their heads, much less their hearts. It takes a special kind of woman, unique to the man in question. But when he meets her, she is special. She is the exception.
The trouble is, the average woman has an incorrigible addiction to the game of cat and mouse. A woman will do everything she can to get inside you, get to know you, root herself in the deepest places of the very foundation of yourself (sometimes in places you didn't even know existed prior to her roots inhabiting them). She will try her damnest to really know you. And she will.
But 9 times out of 10, she'll extract those roots when you least expect it. When you've just gotten comfortable with her presence there, with her making her way into every place in your life she can possibly fit herself. But once she has you, she'll face the question that every woman faces in this position: do I really want this man anymore, now that I've won him over?

And that is the million dollar question.
That is the power of a woman.
That is man's vulnerability. Achilles' tendon of his love life.
They understand you better, so they can hurt you worse.